So is he talking about all drills being dead, or just the way they are drilled? What about learning drills with progressive resistance so you'll be able to have more tools in your toolbox for when you take away the drills and just flat-out spar?

I'm hoping it's the latter, because I really do think training drills like hubud or largo or whatever, deflections, even energy drills (my apologies for namedropping FMA and JKD terms) can be extremely helpful if you practice them and practice them and then drill them force-on-force against skilled fully resisting opponents at real speeds. They teach timing, sectoring, mechanics, recovery, footwork, etc. Maybe not necessary, but I have a friend who's a boxer (a very good one) and he said that he can certainly manage to pull off a lot of moves (foot sweeps, arm wrenches from the clinch, and other unconventional things) that are a DIRECT result of energy drills he's done. They definitely give him options others may not have, opening them up in ways they don't know how to defend. I think it's good for options

Obviously some drills suck and are developed for the attack instead of the other way around, but I think this can be true in ANY art... and that it's hard to tell what you'll end up using once you step out of the box and freeflow, or spar, or whatever you call it.

I thought it was interesting that he said weapons are what people should be using for self-defense. I'm a huge fan of weapons, but they're kind of hard to use when you slip or are tackled or somehow find them out of reach (which happens all the time even to the best fighters when their real-life situation doesn't fit into their neat little plan). There's the whole thing about ACCESSING your weapon. And I think if one's goal is self-defense they really do need a core of basics from a variety of arts so that they will be able to "pass" in ALL ranges, and of course an emphasis on PREVENTION.

And the dude in that video who said that being able to fight will give you more confidence, which will deter your attacker in the first place--that sounds right on to me. They showed pictures of women to guys behind bars and asked them who they would attack and the common denominator was posture. There was another study done using inmates convicted of violent crimes and they all individually picked out the same "victims" in a video--they all picked the white bread, people not paying attention, people with submissive body language, etc.

So if somebody told me they trained for self-defense, I wouldn't tell them the weapon is the ultimate solution, I would tell them to frickin' work on pre-fight strategies. Awareness, avoidance, de-escalation, escape, what crimes are common in the area, what the assailants usually look like, etc. Next to nobody ever drills this, incorporates thinking under pressure in their drills, but they should. Next I would say to develop some level of comfort in all ranges, which unfortunately usually means training in different arts and trying to integrate it on your own. And then combatives on top of that, of course.

sgbi's aproach is the 3Is: introduce, isolate, integrate. so during the intro and isolate phases of learning, there IS a lot of repetitive drilling--that's not what he was saying is the problem. he's talking about MA forms that have devolved from legit fighting to Ernie Reyes West Coast Tae Kwan Do, in which the elements of reality and variation are removed and skills are learned and practiced essentially in a vacuum--in other words, they never progress from intro and isolate to integrate--never roll or play or really have to employ their skills in realistic situations in which they're unaware of what their opponent is going to do, when, how, how hard, etc.

Fair enough, and I learned the hard way after years and years of karate that not only did I not know how to fight, but I didn't know how to punch or kick either, and I'm still unlearning that damn stance. My favorite way of testing newfound skills from a seminar or whatnot is to take it to a completely different place. Last time I did a WSD course (it was actually a good one and we did drill and then practice against progressive resistance, esp. me because I told all the guys to go really really hard so I could make sure I got it and wondered the next morning whether that was really necessary) I learned four techniques that I thought were questionable and took 'em to some guys I train with, without telling them what the technique was. Two of the four worked, one required some modification for my body type, and one will never ever work.

BUT if the whole point of training is for fun, or "an intense form of yoga" or whatever you want to call it, why does it matter whether it's realistic or not?
What if someone gets more pleasure from practicing skills in a vaccuum at Ernie Reyes West Coast Tae Kwon Do than, say, MMA? Training might be more fun than dead forms once you actually get down to sparring, but there's probably more drama, ego, politics, bullshit, game playing, etc. than just about any other activity I can think of. If I wasn't getting tangible self-defense skills out of it, I would have quit a long time ago and switched to, like, qi gong or something as it took me close to four years to find a tolerable "realistic" training situation.

Also I'm not so sure that all people go as hard as they can in all MMA classes, or at least, that hasn't been my experience. What about people who freeze up or won't use much force at all, or people who have little technique and use a ton of force to prove themselves--e.g. their training partner already tapped out so why not quit cranking when they don't have the choke on right anyway--I bet everyone has seen this or something like it...

Fair enough, and I learned the hard way after years and years of karate that not only did I not know how to fight, but I didn't know how to punch or kick either, and I'm still unlearning that damn stance. My favorite way of testing newfound skills from a seminar or whatnot is to take it to a completely different place. Last time I did a WSD course (it was actually a good one and we did drill and then practice against progressive resistance, esp. me because I told all the guys to go really really hard so I could make sure I got it and wondered the next morning whether that was really necessary) I learned four techniques that I thought were questionable and took 'em to some guys I train with, without telling them what the technique was. Two of the four worked, one required some modification for my body type, and one will never ever work.

BUT if the whole point of training is for fun, or "an intense form of yoga" or whatever you want to call it, why does it matter whether it's realistic or not?
What if someone gets more pleasure from practicing skills in a vaccuum at Ernie Reyes West Coast Tae Kwon Do than, say, MMA? Training might be more fun than dead forms once you actually get down to sparring, but there's probably more drama, ego, politics, bullshit, game playing, etc. than just about any other activity I can think of.

Okay. I'm not dissing SBGi, the articles on that site totally blow me away.

If good, talented fighters who have a lot of heart want to hone their instinctual, natural, genetic urge to "tussle" because it's "fun" and a "more intense form of yoga," rather than learning to be protectors, I guess that's their decision! Hopefully one they've thought out.

Should they change their minds and decide that they want to use their hard-earned ability (to fight with skill under stress and against resistance) to protect themselves and others instead of just for fun yoga, at least they are training in a way that could be transferable to real-life situations if they do a bit of scenario training and learn what modifications to make.

"Of every hundred men, ten shouldn't even be there. Eighty are nothing but targets. Nine are the real fighters. We are lucky to have them, they make the battle. Ah, but the One! One of them is a Warrior...and he will bring the others back." -Hericletus

I find it interesting when you come on the same information in different ways.

When Robb posted the video I sent it to a friend of mine who is a 2nd degree black in Uechi Ryu Karate (SP) and we discussed what Matt was talking about. I have started to train in BJJ and have been reading posts from Aesopian on the MMA forum and he started his own blog. Interestingly enough there are a couple of articles on the front page from Matt.